


Care Package

by Lirillith



Category: Free!
Genre: Cookies, Fluff, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, RinRei Week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-29
Updated: 2014-12-29
Packaged: 2018-03-04 00:03:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2893001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lirillith/pseuds/Lirillith
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No one ever really clued Rei in about Rin's lack of a sweet tooth.  Not until he was well into the process of putting together a care package, that is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Care Package

The first joint practice of the season was a relief — for one thing, it meant Iwatobi's club was big enough to survive another year — and a golden opportunity as well, because it meant Rei had some time to talk with his fellow captain. Not very much, given that Nitori had a large team to corral, a horror of being called Ai-chan in front of the first-years, and a hyperactive friend to control who made Nagisa look sedate, but Rei was determined to get a chance to talk to him about subjects beyond swimming.

Subjects like Rin.

Nitori had been Rin's roommate for a whole year, immediately after his return from Australia. His perspective would be invaluable.

It was an ongoing project — Rei had been taking surreptitious notes from Rin's emails and their Skype conversations, and less-surreptitious notes when he grilled Gou, though she was an enthusiastic contributor once he explained — to determine what specific products from Japan Rin missed the most and had trouble finding in Australia. The care package was almost ready. He couldn't import entire vending machines to Australia, but he could send Rin his favorite brands of instant noodles or curry mix.

"I was going to make a batch of homemade cookies, of course, but there's plenty of room, so if you can think of anything he ever mentioned not being able to get in Australia—"

"Um, about the cookies…"

No matter how Nagisa gleefully described it later, over and over, as if both Rei and their new first-years and the entire Samezuka team hadn't been present to hear it, Rei did not scream. It wasn't a scream, or a screech, or a squawk, it was not _high-pitched,_ and he almost certainly did not sound like a pterodactyl, because no one knew what dinosaurs sounded like anyway. He might have shouted a little. That was all.

 

Rin didn't like sweets.

It was tactful of him never to mention that himself, probably, but Rei had carefully plotted out the entire care package — a section for packaged foods, a section for toiletries, a section for magazines — and now he had a gaping hole where a carefully selected tin full of cookies should have gone.

"Just make him cookies that aren't too sweet," Nagisa suggested at lunch the next day, mouth full.

"But how sweet is too sweet? Sugar is part of the recipe for a reason! You can't just reduce the amount or it throws off the chemistry of the entire recipe—"

"Why's it have to be cookies?"

"It has to be something homemade, right?" Gou asked, to Rei's surprise.

"Exactly," he said. Something homemade, ideally something kind of cute (and preferably butterfly-shaped or at least decorated with butterflies) which could be packaged attractively. "And not only homemade, but it needs to survive in the mail."

"A cake wouldn't work at all," she said. "And there aren't many salty or savory foods that work nearly that well as a really pretty gift. It's got to be sweets."

"But he may not like anything sweet at all!"

"His loss," Nagisa mumbled around another mouthful of cream pan.

"Don't look at me," Gou said. "This is all news to me. He's never complained to Mom."

"He never complained to me, either! He'd rather just suffer in silence—"

"Rei-chan," Nagisa interrupted, sounding very serious.

"Yes?"

"Goro-chan was right. You're _totally_ the kind to be weakened by love."

Unsure whether to demand the origin of the comment, the identity of Goro-chan — no, wait, that was coach Sasabe — or just to take umbrage at that characterization, Rei buried his face in his hands. He couldn't deny it was a scream this time. A small one.

 

Most of the remaining lunch hour was dedicated to explaining Nagisa's comment. That also helped explain Gou's mysterious attempt to help him with his love life nearly a year before, because somehow he'd never pieced together that she wasn't acting independently of the others.

Back when Rin was giving him private swimming lessons. She'd hit uncomfortably close to the mark, really, even if it had taken him a while to do anything about it.

For friends who'd tried to be so supportive when they'd been almost completely wrong about everything, they were doing a terrible job of moral support now; Rei was left to search the internet on his phone between classes, in vain, for cookie recipes that weren't sweet.

"Seriously, though. What's the point of a cookie that's not sweet?" Nagisa asked as they walked to the pool together.

"Giving me something to send to Rin-san!"

"You'll just have to invent them, then! Experiment! I'll eat all your failures!"

Rei wasn't going to dignify that with a response. "So I guess it's just a bunch of cans of deodorant and bowls of instant noodles! How romantic! How beautiful!"

"Make him some rice crackers or something."

"Can those even be made at home?" Rei pulled out his phone again.

"Then buy him some." Nagisa sounded like he was bored with this subject now that it wasn't likely to produce free cookies for him. "He doesn't snack much anyway, remember?"

"Everyone snacks less than you."

Were rice crackers really the best choice? He could hardly pack up a bento and ship it overseas. Nothing frozen, perishable, or fragile would work. Liquids were heavy. Cookies had seemed ideal.

Nagisa's selfless offer to be a guinea pig might almost help, but there there was one hitch.

"Nagisa-kun, have you ever tasted anything you thought was too sweet?"

"Mmmm.... nope. Never. Why?"

"Never mind."

 

Despite the length of the plane journey between Japan and Australia — Rei checked it, routinely, scheduling fantasy flights and then closing out the window before he could follow through — the time difference was only two hours, and they could talk most nights.

"Okay," Rin said, the first moment their conversation flagged. "Spit it out. What's bothering you?"

Fine, then. It wasn't like he'd ever pretended he was much good at hiding his emotions. "Why didn't you tell me you didn't like sweets?"

"What? I— you— what?"

"Those cookies I made you!"

"What the hell! Those cookies were great! I ate all of them!"

"But Nitori-san told me you don't like sweets!"

"Dammit, Ai... when I said you two should support each other I meant, like, training regimens, joint practices." Rin rubbed his face. "You gave me those cookies a year ago!"

"You knew exactly which cookies I was talking about."

"Well... yeah." He looked away from the camera, suddenly very interested in adjusting something on his desk Rei couldn't see. "First thing you ever gave me. 'Course I'm going to remember it."

"Rin-san..."

"So, uh..." He turned his focus back to the camera, frowning again. "That's not the point! Why this all of a sudden?"

"And I gave you chocolate for Valentine's Day!"

"Yeah, really dark chocolate. That was awesome. No complaints there."

"But you didn't like the cookies." Maybe Nagisa — and Coach Sasabe, apparently, because it seemed _everyone he knew_ had gotten in on the game of analyzing his love life before he even had one — had a point about him. He felt like the most annoying, clingy drama heroine imaginable.

"I ate _every last one_ of those cookies. Okay, no, I let Momo have a couple ‘cause he begged and whined. Don’t do that, by the way.  It’s like giving a puppy table scraps, it just encourages him. But that was it. I ate all but two of the cookies."

"You forced yourself to eat all those cookies for me?"

"It's not like I can't eat sweets at all. I'm not allergic. I was just kinda slow."

"Hmm..."

"Rei. Seriously. What the hell brought this on?"

It was supposed to be a surprise — not just the homemade cookies but the entire existence of the care package — but Rei's willpower crumpled like tissue paper when Rin turned that serious, earnest look on him.

And then it promptly stiffened back up into outrage when Rin started laughing midway through his explanation. "Fine, maybe I shouldn't send you anything after all! Since there's nothing homemade I can provide and the idea of sending you instant curry packets and soups and toiletries is so absurd that—"

"Rei, no, for crying out loud. It's just — I was in the middle of putting together — hold on a sec, I know it gives you motion sickness if I move the camera too much." Rei had to look away from the screen, still fuming, as Rin picked up and moved the laptop, then he heard a slightly distant, "Take a look."

It took a moment to make sense of what he was seeing. The brown cardboard box contained an array of unfamiliar packages, all labeled in English. "Tim... Tam?" He couldn't see the labels on the jars.

"Putting the computer back," Rin said, sounding like he was about to laugh. Rei looked away again, at his own half-assembled box. All the suggestions from Rin's friends and family, with a big hole in the middle where he'd intended to put the finishing touch. The personal touch.

"Tim Tams are this... chocolate thing. Not for me, but people here are crazy about them. They sell 'em at some import stores in Japan because Australians cannot live without these things." He was smiling; there was no way Rei could stay angry while looking at that. "I've been working on it for a while, asking everybody I know about Australian stuff to send you."

"For the past two or three weeks?" Rei asked. That was when he'd gone to work in earnest.

"Exactly."

So much for outrage. Rei felt a little teary-eyed, in fact.

"Gotta say, I never even thought of putting anything homemade in there."

"There's no need for you to do that! This is all on my side! Or it would be." He was far too emotionally invested in this cookie business now. "Maybe I should take Nagisa-kun up on his offer. He wants to be the guinea pig while I work on reducing cookie sweetness."

"Nagisa," Rin said. "Nagisa wants to help you make something _less_ sweet."

"I had some reservations as well!"

"Rei," Rin said. "Listen. You've got enough going on. Stop freaking out about cookies. Send me whatever the hell you want, okay? You don't have to make anything on my account, but if you made it, I'm eating it, I don't care how sweet it is. Understand?"

"Rin-san..." Definitely a little teary-eyed. His glasses were in urgent need of cleaning, and he couldn't possibly speak another word until he'd addressed this.

"Um but I just wanna say," Rin added. "That's just for whatever you send. The stuff I'm sending you — if you don't like it you can just pitch it. No worries. I won't be offended."

"But if it's something you sent to me—"

"Just — Vegemite's not for everybody, and a little bit of it goes a long way. Don't feel obligated or anything."

**Author's Note:**

> No offense intended to the honor of either Tim Tams or Vegemite. Though I will vouch that I spotted the former on prominent display in an import store in Kyoto Station.


End file.
